Passing on good taste

Legacies are small pockets of history passed down from generation to generation. They are the memories of that certain person, this certain place—even a certain event that happened.

One of the most beautiful legacies anyone can pass on is a recipe. A recipe alone could be something delicious, but a recipe with a history—well, those flavors paint a dozen beautiful stories. Here below are three dishes that don’t just trigger that natural response to salivate while imagining each dish shining in front of you—these have actually been created and passed down from generation to generation.

Melt-in-Your-Mouth Ensaymada

The story of perfecting a soft, fluffy pastry topped off with a good amount of cheese started out with a mother and her sister-in-law revamping an old ensaymada recipe.

“When my brother and I moved out of the house for college, this was what helped my mom cope with the empty nest and our being gone,” said Beatrice “Bea” Montenegro, an Architectural graduate and daughter to her mother, Bernice. Bea said that her mother started selling the ensaymadas she baked in December 2012.

“Her first customers were just friends who would call to order,” said Bea, who added that the number of customers grew because those who received the ensaymadas as gifts from those friends asked about them and decided to reorder.

Tip: “Ensaymada takes patience because it has a lot to do with the rising. It takes hours to make—we start making a recipe at 5 a.m. then finish around lunchtime,” Bea explained as she mentioned that a lot of the flavor also depended on the ingredients that were used. “We use quality ingredients, like real butter, special quality cheese and whole eggs—never use margarine.”

For big quantities, Montenegro advises customers to call about two to three days before pick up for proper preparation.

Juicy Steamed Shrimp

The recipe of juicy Asian-style steamed shrimp plays a part in the story of a man and his business. Natassha “Sassha” Yu, a third-generation recipe-holder, talked about her grandmother (Ciriaca Carcel) and how she had been making the dish even before Sassha was born.

“It’s been in my family for three generations—as far as I know,” she said. “It started with my paternal grandmother who passed it on to her daughter-inlaw—my mom—who passed it on to me.” Sassha continued by telling the story of how her father had started a shrimp business in his early years, which had later contributed to the recipe on an even bigger scale.

Tip: “What you do for this recipe is you steam the shrimp for two minutes—making sure that the shrimp is completely defrosted and the water is already steaming before you put it in. For the sauce, use sesame oil, Kikkoman (soy sauce) and chopped spring onions—but the ultimate secret to any good shrimp recipe is fresh shrimp,” said Sassha, who also mentioned how lucky they were to get their shrimp supply from her father’s shrimp farm, Sean Agro, which also supplies shrimp locally and takes orders too.

“We harvest our shrimp every day or two days from our farms around Cebu and Butuan,” she said. “We only sell sashimi grade so you can also eat it raw—if the shrimp is not sashimi grade, you risk getting sick.”

Soda-infused Chiffon Cake

The light and fluffy-as-acloud soda-infused chiffon cake tells the story of how a dedicated wife and grandmother who lived in the United States was forced to be resourceful one day when she realized she lacked an ingredient for her signature chiffon cake.

“One day, I was lacking one ingredient for my chiffon cake and decided to use Sprite to replace it—and it worked!” Rebecca Kuizon Labrador shared cheerfully as she explained how gleeful she was at the discovery of a new way to change and add flavor. “My husband loves the chiffon cakes I bake, and I can make so many different flavors,” Rebecca said after she mentioned how light and fluffy the texture of the cake was and how it was delicious without being too sweet.

Tip: “Make sure to separate the egg whites from the yolk. That is important because it is what really creates that certain texture,” she told her granddaughter. “I don’t sell it but maybe one day—after I teach you—you can sell it in the Philippines.”